The internet's making it possible to live off your art without striking the big-time. A "blue-collar artist", if you will. More people need to realize this, and I aim to make 'em.

Monday, August 6, 2012

Things are brewing...

So, we're well into the final week of the OUYA Kickstarter and I finally decided to start writing some posts. This blog won't always just be about the OUYA, but for now it's gonna be a pretty big focus. So, what's going on with it right now? Not much. But that may be about to change.

Despite generally showing a good online presence, Boxer8, CEO Julie Uhrman, and the OUYA staff have been pretty silent for the past few days, even though it was the final weekend of their KS. Uhrman tweeted that she'd been spending a lot of time making sure she answered every developer inquiry, so that's probably part of the reason we haven't heard from them in a while.

But now they're done with that. Could they have a few final surprises to unleash for the final push? I wouldn't bet against them. Say what you will about the OUYA's chances in the market, Boxer8 has shown itself to have damn savvy marketers. I'd expect OUYA to make the news several times in the next few days.

But even if OUYA works up some new buzz, sometimes the biggest Kickstarters don't receive much of a "final push", the big flood of donations in the last few days of a project that most successful Kickstarters see. Take a look at the graph from the Pebble watch's Kickstarter:

You can see that after a certain point, money just stopped coming in. It's possible OUYA has pretty much maxed out, and almost everyone that's interested has already donated. So, with less than three days left, will they break $7 million? Maybe even cross the $10m mark and end up breaking Pebble's record?

I'll leave you with one thing to consider. Many people are still very skeptical about the OUYA. If Boxer8 can do something this week to meaningfully increase their credibility, don't be surprised to see a few more dollars roll in. But, that's a pretty big "if".

Coming up next:
Where are all the OUYA games? If you look at what Boxer8 has announced, there's only about 4 or 5 games. But if you do some digging, there's dozens of worthwhile games coming. They just haven't gotten any exposure yet. Now, none of them are huge AAA games, but if you're an OUYA fan you probably already know that there's a lot of fun to be had with smaller-scale indie games. I'll be highlighting a few of these "Ouya Jewels" every day or two, so check back if you wanna see what's really out there.